As announced by the Vice-Chancellor, Project Transform has reached a key stage in the transition to a new way of working for the University, which puts students firmly at the heart of everything we do.

The Transform Programme Board has approved the proposal to move to a new organisation design model, which will see many of the student services previously provided in schools and professional services departments moving online and into Service Centres located across our UK campuses. This will ensure a streamlined, consistent student experience which helps us deliver our vision to operate globally, deliver locally and engage personally.

Project Transform aims to improve substantially the support for students and academic staff around the student journey. As well as new systems and processes, there has been an intention from the outset to revise how support is organised to improve service quality and efficiency. A Working Group of students, Professional Services and academic staff chaired by PVC Professor Sarah O’Hara has been investigating the optimum organisational model for student administration.

The roles, organisation structures, and number of posts required to deliver this new model will be defined over the next two months, and presented to the Transform Programme Board for approval on 6 October 2015.

We will then move into a period of consultation with Trade Unions and staff whose roles are affected by the proposed changes. All affected staff will have confirmation of their roles by April 2016 at the latest.

The objectives for Project Transform identified that our operating model should be reviewed as part of the implementation of a new IT system and to support business processes.

Student support services are currently delivered through a range of central services, student Service Centres and twenty-three Schools organised into five Faculties. Service delivery is not integrated and as a result is often inconsistent, which can impact negatively on the student experience.

The introduction of a new, powerful student management IT system, simplified and joined up business processes and an ambition to significantly enhance the student and staff experience require a new model.

We will bring delivery of most student services and administration together through a series of Service Centres distributed across the University’s UK campuses. This provides a number of benefits that directly address the shortcomings of the current operating model:

• A conveniently located and expert service for all students irrespective of where they study.
• Bringing what are currently central services closer to academic staff improving their interactions with those services, whilst retaining key academic-related student activities in local environments
• Providing an integrated and inclusive career structure for APM staff within a new unified organisation and breaking down existing barriers between the ‘centre’ and schools.
• Substantially reducing costs across the University by restricting the need to provide expertise in the new systems and processes to a small number of locations, and by making the implementation and maintenance of standardised processes more manageable.

Visit the Project Transform workspace for:

• The full briefing paper that went to UEB and Programme Board
• FAQs on how the changes could affect roles and processes at the University
• A list of contacts for more information

You’ll need to be logged into workspace for these links to take you directly to the documents.

Professor Karen Cox
Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Project Transform sponsor